I am considering purchasing ActiveForums Std edition, should I wait for the next version of DNN Forum?

How long will I have to wait?

What are people's opinions of the 2 modules?

As the next release of the  DNN forum module has just passed dog-fooding, I'd wait a little while if possible so that a proper comparison can be made.

That is not a concern, the dogfooding step has been removed from the release process. As an inner core team member who is in charge of a module very important to the dnn.com site, I have a copy of dnn.com data which I have tested the upgraded process on at least 50 times. Because the few people that can handle the actual dogfooding are extremely consumed w/ the DNN Corporation, this was a necessary removal from the process. I am working w/ Shaun this week to upgrade the live site here (hopefully).

Just an FYI, I have had a team and many people testing this module for nearly 6 months so I feel fairly confident that what is releasing is ten fold better than the previous release (at least) and works in a variety of production environments. Oh yeah, I about half way done w/ the follow up release already that will contain mainly ajax enhancements.